UNVARNISHED

The life of high-end bartending gets a thorough examination in this vivid memoir of setting up and running a Los Angeles establishment.

Like many graduates of performing arts schools, Alperin had to get side jobs in New York to support his dream of becoming an actor. The more he worked, the more he realized that bartending, which has its own dramatic side, was his true calling. In this brash and insightful book co-written with screenwriter and journalist Stoll, Alperin traces his move to LA, where, with “barfly entrepreneur” Cedd Moses and the colorful “microdoser” Sasha Petraske (“central casting's wet dream of the nutty professor”), he opened The Varnish, a small bar dedicated to precise renderings of classic cocktails, the “kind of place someone would want to tell their friends about but also keep to themselves.” This isn't the usual breezy or dutiful as-told-to memoir but rather a deep and meticulous dive into Alperin's personality and experiences. Consequently, sometimes the narrative is spectacularly and absorbingly dorky: If you haven't thought about the process of making ice or about those cubes or chunks we unthinkingly drop into our glasses, you will now. Just as often, the text zooms in on the minutiae of a night in the life of the bartender: “Bostick dry-shakes a Ramos gin fizz with short, hard strokes while I stir up a manhattan in a mixing glass, like spinning a spool of liquid silk, the rye’s dark legs spiraling down the glass, lightening in color as it dilutes.” Alperin doesn't hold back on the details of his personal life, revealing plenty about drugs and anonymous sex. The book also includes a substantial midsection with instructions on how to make enough familiar and exotic drinks to keep the home drinker occupied for a lifetime.

Even teetotalers will relish the insights into this arcane world.